


Propaganda

by TheMockingCrows



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Computer Viruses, Incest, M/M, Mind Control, Sadstuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2016-05-21
Packaged: 2018-06-09 18:19:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6917995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMockingCrows/pseuds/TheMockingCrows
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Through a grievous oversight, I realize I never uploaded this to AO3 after the HSWC some years back. Fixing that now.)</p>
<p>When Dirk’s boyfriend, Davesprite, starts acting strange, it’s up to Dirk to figure out what’s wrong. But is Davesprite just hiding something, or is a larger force at play?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Propaganda

**Author's Note:**

> Original tumblr link: http://themockingcrows.tumblr.com/post/55609453253/propaganda  
> Accompanying art from the round: http://insecureillustrator.tumblr.com/post/55680487302/fullview-a-rather-last-minute-illustration-i-did

It had started with simple things. Fibs, white lies, stretching of the truth. Dirk’s book was in the kitchen instead of the bedroom. His toolbox was in the living room instead of outside. Davesprite had taken his clippers to try trimming his talons again. He hadn’t given them back, but swore up and down that he had.

 

His single minded conviction and insistence was moving, to say the least.

 

“Dave, you don’t need to lie to me. I know you have them,” said Dirk evenly. He wasn’t mad, just confused. He’d seen the clippers not ten minutes ago in Davesprite’s junk drawer, one of the few places he kept anything personal. Bits of stones and fabric, a few pictures, a gray cap he’d found that he wouldn’t let anyone else touch, a few of the larger stiff feathers he’d shed. And Dirk’s clippers, apparently.

 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dirk, I gave them back. Why are you acting like I’m lying? Do you think it’d be worth it to lie about something like that?” He snapped in his irritation. The clippers hadn’t done a damn thing to the hard material of his claws and they’d slipped out of his leathery fingers a half-dozen times in the attempt.

 

“Dave. Dude. Come on. I don’t have them anymore and you had them last. Maybe you just forgot to give them back?” Dirk insisted. “You can tell me, I won’t be mad.” Was he afraid of having messed up, or ruined something? It didn’t make sense for Davesprite to be so damned evasive. He fixated on minutiae and talked in circles when he was upset, that was pretty much standard behavior, but… something was very different this time.

 

Davesprite hissed sharply, wings snapping out defensively to loom up behind his head as he scowled.

 

“Alright. This shit ends now. Okay? Stop. Stop everything. Stop calling me Dave. It’s Davesprite. I’m not Normal Dave, alright? Also stop insisting I’ve got your damn clippers. Newsflash: I don’t. I took them, then I gave them back. They. Aren’t. Here.”

 

“They’re in your drawer.”

 

“Are not.”

 

“I saw them myself, Dave!”

 

“DaveSPRITE!”

 

“Fine. Davesprite. Whatever. But seriously, dude, I just saw them. I can go get them if you want, to show you.”

 

Daveprite’s teeth gritted against each other, and he made a very unbirdlike growl of frustration.

 

“If you apparently knew what happened to your stupid tools, why give me all this shit about it? Why not just get them yourself instead of playing your fucked up mindgames?”

 

“Wait, what are y-”

 

“No. Fuck this, I’m out.” In a flurry or orange feathers, he was gone, agitated caws ringing through the halls as he drifted away.

Something was definitely not right here.

 

\- - - - - - - - -

 

Something was even more wrong than Dirk had originally thought. Over the last month he’d begun to record his conversations with Davesprite via a small microphone he tucked out of sight. A bug, basically. He barely had to hide it at all: if he put something behind fragile objects or things Davesprite could easily destroy by accident, he avoided them like the plague. Dirk felt like an asshole taking advantage of it, but this was serious business.

 

Davesprite was beginning to lie, apparently without even being aware of it. It was stupid, easily debunked things as well, which wasn’t irritating as much as it was unnerving. Obviously, the sprite wasn’t stupid. He was smart and outspoken and direct as a punch, when he felt like it. Now..?

 

He’d lie about the weather outside, something so obvious as whether it was raining or not. He’d lie about what was for lunch, sandwiches instead of soup. Lies about the time, where objects were, what had happened earlier, who he’d spoken to. Even lies about the color of things.

 

Bug in place, Dirk figured it was time to see how far this weird shit went. Time to get more data. Being sure to keep his voice calm, not looking up, Dirk asked, “Hey, Davesprite. What color would you say you are, dude?”

 

“What color am I. Are you kidding me, did you go blind now? It’s the shades, isn’t it. They’ve taken over your brain.”

 

“Nah, just wondering what you’d call your particular hue. In your words.”

 

“…Hm. Well. I guess I’m pretty blue.”

 

“Blue.”  
  


“Yeah, blue.”

 

“… Davesprite, you’re saying the total opposite. You’re obviously orange, bro. Look at you. You look like a pissed-off tangerine with a tail most days.”

 

The conversation was cut short as Davesprite’s feathers puffed up in irritation and he fled. Not the first time he’d bailed on an argument in a puff of down. He’d be back in a few hours, surely. Quietly, too. They didn’t talk much for a while after Dirk caught him in something like this. When Davesprite came back they’d curl up and they’d spend a while saying nothing while Davesprite preened and fussed both of them into a state that satisfied him enough to relax, and Dirk let him do it. They stayed close, wrapped up and breathing slow. Whatever the hell was going on with Davesprite, his body language told Dirk things hadn’t changed between them. Not much, anyway.

 

That was later, though. For now he had some time to review his data. Dirk rose and fished out the recorder, uploading the files and added in the new data. As he thought: the instances of blatant lying had skyrocketed. Not just by Davesprite, though Dirk’s data on the others was patchier. Nothing really stood out as blatant or troublesome, nothing like blue for orange. Jaspersprite seemed quite content to keep to himself. Nannasprite was a prankster anyway, so sifting the mistakes from the bullshit was tricky. There were hints of something going on with those two, not much more than that.

 

Davesprite’s hints weren’t hints, unless you counted a fire in a theater as a hint to leave. There was a definite difference even in how he was behaving. He was cagier, angry. Tense. There was something wrong, no doubt about that, but…he still couldn’t tell what. Did Davesprite know? Dirk wondered. He’d asked, he’d pried, he’d gotten fed-up and demanded, and Davesprite had flown away pretty much every time. Like this time. Dirk knew damn well what Davesprite sounded like when he was making something up to mess with him—there was a very specific tone of innocent earnestness shaded with snarky horseshit. The recordings he’d just replayed didn’t have that tone. Cagey and tense seemed about right for somebody who called orange blue and didn’t know why. That wasn’t a pleasant thought.

 

The tension and frustration were more apparent when Dirk replayed the files for him that evening, pointing out the obvious falsehoods and the truth behind them. Ten minutes into the highlight reel of bizarre and inexplicable behavior, Davesprite covered his ears with his scaled palms and peeped softly to himself, eyes scrunched shut behind their orange shades.

 

“Turn it off.”

 

“Davesprite, come on, try to tell me what’s going on.”

 

“Turn. It. Off.”

 

“Just tell me what this is about. Are you being told to do this? The other sprites are acting wonky too, but I can’t tell if that’s just normal for them or not. You’re the key to this whole problem,” Dirk insisted, pushing further.

 

“I said. Turn it OFF! Turn it off! Turn it off! TURN IT OFF. NOW,” Davesprite cried, lashing his tail across the speakers. The last few seconds of the file played out and trailed off, Davesprite’s voice cracked and distorted by the ruined hardware. His eyes looked wild, crazed when they re-opened, pupils narrowed to slits. Dirk backed away hastily.

 

“Come on, dude, calm your delicately frilled face, alright? It’s off.”

“Why would you do something like that?! Recording me, that’s the lowest thing you can do! It’s almost as bad as taking someone’s snacks. Wait till I report you to the bureau!”

“… Excuse me?” Dirk asked, raising a brow. Okay, this was new. “What bureau?”

 

“The bureau of environmental affairs! I remember my stint with them fondly, raining coins down to the masses below as they sang their national song. Don’t you forget it, either.”

 

Something was very, very wrong, and it was showing in his eyes. They flickered green for a moment, bright and luminous, before they went red-orange once more.

“…Davesprite, chill. You’re not making any sense.” Please, God, calm down. Give him time to think. Time to fix whatever was happening. “Do you wanna lay down for a bit and take a nap? I know you don’t need to sleep, but maybe it’ll help,” he offered as he reached a gloved hand out to clasp the gently glowing wrist.

 

Immediately, Davesprite struggled and backed away, startled. He raised his hands to either side of his head as if in pain, eyebrows drawn down, tail flicking. His wings curled around his torso to hold himself tightly, hold himself together under some invisible strain as he began to babble again.

 

“If you follow the golden road, it’ll lead you to the bonus level of biodegradable snakes and ladders. Be on the look out for the ghostly golden beef, it tells nothing but disease.”

 

His eyes kept flickering, gazing from Dirk’s face to a space ten feet behind him through the wall, looking more and more terrified. So he was aware of how he sounded, yet continued to speak? Was it unintentional? Was he even able to stop himself, or was this some kind of automated track, like a recording?

 

“Davesprite,” Dirk said suddenly. “Do you love me?”

 

“I can’t love someone who can’t go through the brick wall to Shangri-la!”

 

Davesprite slapped his hands over his mouth as soon as the words left it. His glow died nearly to nothing, fast, wings opening to flutter nervously. Without another word, he flickered and darted away through the wall like a ghost, leaving behind a small tornado of soft down.

 

He only molted off that much when he was under stress or ‘sick’. Sick meant a stuck process, a data leak, or weird feedback from his game coding; it happened sometimes. Maybe that’s what was going on here? Staring at the place in the wall Davesprite had fled through, there was only one thought that hammered itself firmly into place. He was sick.

This had to be fixed, and fast. If not just for Davesprite, then for everyone involved with him who would eventually rely on his sprite abilities to survive.

 

\- - - - - -

 

A sleepless week. That’s what it truly felt like as Dirk bowed low over his computer and work desk yet again, dark bruises of fatigue beneath his eyes as he tried once more to get the patch to work. So far it seemed to be able to defeat firewalls effectively, and he could only hope that it would work with whatever was messing with his boyfriend’s head. He’d chosen a multistage security end-run that would permanently overwrite some of the procedure calls attaching Davesprite to the structure of the game and the world. He wasn’t sure what that was going to do, exactly, but there wasn’t a cheat sheet for this. Davesprite would be okay, he was nearly certain of that. Nearly.

 

More okay than he was now, anyway.

 

Davesprite had been silent since the initial outbursts, drifting in to listlessly touch Dirk’s back or stare at him from the doorway. He opened his mouth occasionally as if words were trying to come out…but kept them to himself. Who knew what he’d say next, incoherent and distorted, unable to parse any sense from it? He didn’t want to hear himself speak, didn’t want to be recorded to track the progress of whatever was in his code. What if it was permanent? Would he always be like this, or would it get worse? Who knew there were diseases or viruses or what the fuck ever that could touch him now?

 

Shaky with exhaustion, Dirk raised a hand to gesture to him on one of his stoic drifts through the room, ready to finally try it.

 

“Hey. C'mere, let me try something. I think I have something that will help you out. You game?” he asked as Davesprite drifted hesitantly closer. He stared at the red patch curiously, eyebrows furrowing as he pointed in a clear “what the fuck is this bullshit” gesture.

 

“It’s a patch. I think because you’re not pure code, some kind of internal firewall is trying to block your organic thoughts. Maybe to keep you from giving us good advice, or because you’re a liability now. I’m not sure at all. But the way you’ve been talking was really similar to a signal running through a few scramblers. If it works, then score, you’re back to being the sarcastic citrus fuck I know and love. If it doesn’t work…I’ll just remove it and keep trying until it does. It won’t hurt you,” he fibbed. He was about ninety five percent it would be perfectly fine, and AR had spared him the rundown on what shitty possibilities lurked in that last five percent. It was better for Davesprite not to know the risk existed at all, better to feel safe. Having his guard down would help with the installation.

 

Dirk stuck the patch between his wings, red peeking out beneath soft ruffles of feathers. He’d considered putting it on the back of his neck, or his chest, but decided it might make him less sensitive about it if it were somewhere on his body he couldn’t see. If it worked, who wanted to keep a palm sized red band aid in plain view all the time?

 

“Okay. I’m gonna try to turn the patch on now. Try to…I don’t know. Reach for it. Try to open your normal mind up so the code can grasp at it. We need it to connect somehow,” Dirk instructed as he lifted up his laptop again, AR working as a secondary processor for the start-up protocols.

 

There was a spark, electrical in nature from the way that Davesprite’s body glowed brighter, wings twitching like he’d been pinched. He frowned and looked over his shoulder uncertainly before looking back to Dirk…then sighing and closing his eyes to focus. They just needed it to connect. Just one good signal, and…oh. Oh, that was something new. Davesprite reached for it with his mind, straining till he felt a little tickle starting. Was this it?

 

Shock, bright red and bolting like lightning began arcing from between the soft plumed wings, traveling over the orange skin and down along his tail. He jerked, cawing and croaking in a moment of panic before hitting the floor with a solid thump and arching rigidly in a full seize, fingers curling sharply towards his palms, eyes rocking back into his head as he began to spasm.  
  
  


Oh. Shit. Dirk shouted for AR to diminish the feedback to the patch by half, thankful to see the red arcs of electricity quickly diminish and disappear. Davesprite’s breathing began to regulate as his body relaxed, lips parted to pant, shivering.

 

“…What the fuck was that?” he mumbled quietly, turning his head to the side with a soft peep. “Seriously, Dirk, what the fuck was that?

 

He’d barely been able to push himself up when he found himself flat on the ground again, a blonde head burying itself into his shoulder, arms wrapped tightly around his feathery ruff as he rocked him back and forth. Dirk wouldn’t respond to his questions, only murmuring “thank god, thank god” as he held on, tangling his fingers into the familiarly soft feathers to itch and scratch, kissing at his shoulders and neck.

 

\- - - - - - -

 

It was hard to say precisely when Dirk noticed something was off with Davesprite again. It had originally been the faint red tinge to the very tips of his feathers and his tail, the darkening of his eyes. Not really a cause for alarm considering a bright red foreign object had been introduced to a body that thrived on codes and connections and subtle amounts of electrical flows.

 

No more was the babble talk either, though… admittedly, Dirk wished it would come back. It would be better than the things Davesprite said now. When they were asleep in Davesprite’s nest or in Dirk’s room, he’d awaken to quiet murmurs in his ear, swearing up and down he could make out the words “Obey. Submit. Cease.” Davesprite wrote it off as him having a nightmare, blaming his work and training schedule for leaving him paranoid and exhausted, hearing things.

 

Dirk wasn’t so sure.

 

He’d caught him hoarding shiny objects more, apparently becoming more magpie than crow. The joking comments and teasing he usually dished out to everyone had become barely concealed insults and threats, harassment. Any online interactions with him ended up with a growing mass of unblockable popups and trite scams, leading Dirk to wonder how to change the settings on the patch without causing him to seize again. He hoped the patch hadn’t been what did this.

 

He wanted to remove it, fix it and try again. When he caught sight of the patch embedded beneath orange skin, barely peeking out from a solid grid work of red and white underneath the sheathe of soft down… Dirk realized it was not going to be that simple.

 

Davesprite didn’t want to be touched on his back after that particular discovery, going out of his way to keep his body turned towards anyone he spoke to at all times, guarding the vulnerable spot with all his might. Not that many people spoke to him any more. Once the pop ups and spam had begun, everyone began to avoid him, not wanting to risk their communication abilities because of a sick sprite. Nanna and Jaspers had already quarantined themselves and their strange speech, but at least made sense online. Or at least as much sense as they’d ever made as sprites.

 

AR was kept at a distance whenever Davesprite wandered in to chitchat as Dirk worked. Basic data sanitation, sure, but also to shut AR up. His wiseass responses egged the sprite on further, making it worse, making him lose more of himself to whatever was working inside him. It was only when the sprite was 'awake’, active and capable of maneuvering around that the infection manifested. Sleep mode, tail gently twitching, breathing soft and slow, peeping now and then? That was most definitely Davesprite.

 

His Davesprite.

 

HIS boyfriend.

 

The puppet was only his waking mind.

 

Mind troubled, Dirk crawled into Davesprite’s nest, braving the inevitable wash of unkindness for the chance to at least enjoy his physical company. He played along, trying his best to ignore the remarks about his weirdness and his inability to make lasting relationships. His almost poisonous quality to those around him due to his manic persistence over things he wanted. The Davesprite he cared for had to be in there somewhere still.

 

To the tune of “Submit, cease, obey” hissing quietly in his ear, Dirk drifted into a troubled sleep, lulled only by the gentle stroking through his hair from rough palms and sharp claws. He was not alone in his suffering, his frustration. Behind dark alien eyes, a terrified human.

 

“Submit,” Davesprite whispered into the dark. “Obey,” he murmured again as he stroked Dirk’s head, his own tipping back with a sharp grimace, as if he were trying to cry. The gesture lasted only a moment before the sharp stab of the red patch kicked in, circuits embedding further into his flesh as his face went perfectly blank once more.

 

“Cease,” he murmured gently as trails of gold wound down his cheeks to drip onto the white of Dirk’s shirt.


End file.
